Friday, October 10, 2014

Why are we in Vietnam Iraq/Syria?

"Led by Lockheed Martin Corp. (LMT), the biggest U.S. defense companies are trading at record prices as shareholders reap rewards from escalating military conflicts around the world.

President Barack Obama approved open-ended airstrikes this month while ruling out ground combat.

“To the extent we can shift away from relying on troops and rely more heavily on equipment -- that could present an opportunity.”[enthused a chief investment officer who oversees $66 billion including Northrop Grumman Corp. and Boeing Co.]

Investors see rising sales for makers of missiles, drones and other weapons as the U.S. hits Islamic State fighters in Syria and Iraq. The U.S. also is the biggest foreign military supplier to Israel, which waged a 50-day offensive against the Hamas Islamic movement in the Gaza Strip.

Lockheed, the world’s biggest defense company, reached an all-time high of $180.74 on Sept. 19, when Northrop, Raytheon Co.and General Dynamics Corp. also set records. That quartet and Chicago-based Boeing accounted for about $105 billion in federal contract orders last year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

In its first night of airstrikes into Syria, the U.S. dropped about 200 munitions and launched 47 Raytheon-made Tomahawk cruise missiles, according to U.S. Central Command. The military also deployed Boeing’s GBU-32 Joint Direct Attack Munitions and Hellfire missiles from Bethesda, Maryland-based Lockheed, creating an opening for restocking U.S. arsenals."

Meanwhile, stop me if you've also heard this one before ... From the LA Times, yesterday :

"Iraqi news outlets reported Monday that at least 18 civilians, mostly women and children, were killed in an airstrike on a town under siege by fighters from the extremist group Islamic State. Hit’s general hospital received 18 bodies, including three women and eight children, all killed in an airstrike.

Maj. Curtis J. Kellogg, a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command, said there was “no evidence” of civilian casualties in Hit."

6 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Patrick Cockburn "Despite what President Obama was saying about this great big coalition of 44 countries, the U.S. has held at arm’s length the people who are actually fighting ISIS, such as the Syrian Kurds and the Syrian army and other groups in Iraq and Syria. And their alliance is with those who are not fighting ISIS and say they don’t intend to, such as Turkey. So, I think that this lack of direct liaison with the people who are fighting on the ground probably makes it much easier for ISIS to withstand these air attacks and for these air attacks to have any accuracy."

The oil and gas barons, profit big time from wars. Harper calling Russia and Putin evil Communists? Harper still exports weapons to Russia. Not only that? Harper has sold Canada to Communist China.

Harper said, he was requested to play a bigger role in the war with ISIS. The US said, they did no such thing. What was Harper going to bomb, rubble into pebbles? It was already said, bombing isn't working.

I believe Mulcair was right. All Harper has done is, endanger Canada for terrorist attacks.

Harper forced his way into this war with ISIS. Harper is a pariah and no-one wants him.

Thanks for this, Alison. The Scahill clip drives home the reality of the Permanent Warfare State (PWS). It's a reality explored by Bacevich in "The New American Militarism" in which he documents today's military-industrial-neoconservative-Christian fundamentalist-for-profit commercial warfighting complex. Perhaps the only real success it has achieved is in recruiting the UK, Australia and Canada into its Foreign Legion.